f 3.
[ 1417 ]
H YM ENOPH YLLXJM
Wing-stalked Filrnyalaturo.
leaf.
CRYPTOGAMIA Filices.
Gen. Char. Fructifications inserted into the margin of
the frond, distinct. Invohtcrum 2-valved, flattish,
straight, opening outwards, longer than the column.
Spec. Char. Fronds tripinnate, lobed, decurrent; segments
linear, bluntish, entire. Main stalk and
branches winged. Fructifications oblong, crenate,
solitary at the upper edge o f the base o f each subdivision
o f the frond.
Syn. HymenophyHumTunbrigense(3. Sm. FI. B r i t . 1142.
Trichomanes pyxidiferum. Huds. 461. B o lt . F i l . 56.
t. 30. W i th . 781. H u ll. 243.
T. Tunbridgense var. 3. W i th . 782. H u ll. 244.
Filix humilis repens, foliis pellucidis et splendentibus,
caule alato. D i l l , in R a i i Syn. 127. t. .3.ƒ. 3, 4.
W e have at length received specimens, one of them in fructification,
of this rare fern, gathered in the county of Kerry,
Ireland, by Mr. Mackay, gardener to the botanic garden at
Dublin. We are now competent to describe it as a new
species. That it is not the American Trichomanes p y x id if
e rum of Linnæus and Swartz, is plain from Plumier’s figure,
our only authority ; nor does it agree with the characters of
any Hymenophyllum in Dr. Swartz’s Essay on Ferns in
Schrader’s Journal. It manifestly differs from H. Tunbridgense,
v . 3. t. 162, in its much greater size and more
compound frond, and in its main stalk being winged from the
very bottom; but more especially in the margin of the segments
being always entire, and in the involucrum or ca lyx ,
being oblong and cylindrical, not obovate and compressed,
except towards the summit; neither is its margin serrated or
toothed, but slightly and obtusely crenate. Few of our British
plants have been more enveloped in doubt than this ; very few
could better repay the scrutiny of the curious botanist.